January 24, 2016
I remember looking through our old Where’s Waldo books as a kid (probably sitting at our step down in front of the heater like I always did). It was a fun puzzle activity. I just asked G if he ever had any and he emphatically said, “I loved them! I got to check them out from the library. But they were one of my favorites.”
Some days I feel like we’re in the middle of a big Where’s Waldo book. If the flock is big enough it’s just a numbers game. How many godwits do I need to look through to find Waldo?
G and I did some math our first day here. If we assume there are 100 banded godwits (most years we have 35 breeding pairs so 70 individuals plus at least 30 chicks that have survived), and there are 20,000 godwits on the island then every 200 godwits should be a green flag. There’s a range though - last year we only had about 25 breeding pairs so to simply the math if there’s only 50 banded it’s every 400th bird.
In reality it seems to be between 4-600 godwits is a green flag. It could be that there’s more than 20,000 godwits, or fewer banded. We know that at least some of our birds winter in Argentina, so there goes some portion of my green flags.
But back to Where’s Waldo. If we have a decent sized flock it often feels like we’re scanning through godwits that are all some variation of the same looking for one particular looking godwit (with a green flag). They all have the red and white sweater, well unless you come across that one in blue that turns out to be a yellowlegs species. Some godwits have the hat and cane some don’t. They all are a little different since they’re molting into breeding plumage and you have to check all their legs carefully. Some have red flags. Then every once in awhile - “There!” - we find the one with the red and white horizontally striped sweater, blue jeans, red and white beanie, glasses, cane, and brown shoes. A green flag! We found Waldo!
Scan update: checked a new site this morning with no godwits and rescanned Linao - a site with many godwits when we checked earlier this month but green flag. We re-found a male we’d seen 100km away and got some good observations before the flock flushed to a different part of the bay to roost.
I remember looking through our old Where’s Waldo books as a kid (probably sitting at our step down in front of the heater like I always did). It was a fun puzzle activity. I just asked G if he ever had any and he emphatically said, “I loved them! I got to check them out from the library. But they were one of my favorites.”
Some days I feel like we’re in the middle of a big Where’s Waldo book. If the flock is big enough it’s just a numbers game. How many godwits do I need to look through to find Waldo?
G and I did some math our first day here. If we assume there are 100 banded godwits (most years we have 35 breeding pairs so 70 individuals plus at least 30 chicks that have survived), and there are 20,000 godwits on the island then every 200 godwits should be a green flag. There’s a range though - last year we only had about 25 breeding pairs so to simply the math if there’s only 50 banded it’s every 400th bird.
In reality it seems to be between 4-600 godwits is a green flag. It could be that there’s more than 20,000 godwits, or fewer banded. We know that at least some of our birds winter in Argentina, so there goes some portion of my green flags.
But back to Where’s Waldo. If we have a decent sized flock it often feels like we’re scanning through godwits that are all some variation of the same looking for one particular looking godwit (with a green flag). They all have the red and white sweater, well unless you come across that one in blue that turns out to be a yellowlegs species. Some godwits have the hat and cane some don’t. They all are a little different since they’re molting into breeding plumage and you have to check all their legs carefully. Some have red flags. Then every once in awhile - “There!” - we find the one with the red and white horizontally striped sweater, blue jeans, red and white beanie, glasses, cane, and brown shoes. A green flag! We found Waldo!
Scan update: checked a new site this morning with no godwits and rescanned Linao - a site with many godwits when we checked earlier this month but green flag. We re-found a male we’d seen 100km away and got some good observations before the flock flushed to a different part of the bay to roost.